Is Fox News incapable Of Owning Up To What They Do - Or Simply Unwilling?

Since the Tuscon shooting, Fox News has been in a state of disassociated personality worthy of the movie Fight Club. Like the Narrator denying what he did as Tyler Durden while clearly approving of the acts he committed as that personality, Fox News is trying to have both its Nazi imagery and its violent rhetoric while insisting they don't exist.

Nazi Imagery:

According to Megyn Kelly, Fox News does not use Nazi imagery; on January 20th, in response to Equality Matters president Richard Socarides stating that Fox News uses Nazi imagery often, Kelly responded by telling him that it’s just not true. Her reasoning? That she watches Fox News all the time, and she’s never seen it. I’m not even going to touch that she actually said pleas for civility shouldn’t apply to cable news or radio hosts when she made this argument- that part pretty much speaks for itself.

The Facts:

I think Kelly just admitted that she doesn’t watch Glenn Beck or Bill O’Reilly, because Media Matters was able to post numerous examples from both of them in their rebuttal to Kelly’s comments- as well as an example from Sean Hannity, regular guest Ann Coulter and Roger Ailes. Plus, there's video of Beck comparing Nazis and Progressives on his show later that same day.

But wait, there's more.

Crooks and Liars has examples Media Matters didn’t list: Bill O’Reilly calling Arianna Huffing ton a Nazi. Let’s see what else they got… O'Reilly said people on the far-left are zealots and Nazis. Think Progress has an article about Fox News standing behind Beck’s smears of Georgre Soros, which invoked Nazi imagery. As we noted, Fox News chief Roger Ailes apologized for using the term "Nazi" when describing NPR but did not apologize to NPR for the characterization.

I’m pretty sure Sean Hannity is inno- never mind. I saw something before I remembered that he has fomented civil war. How about Shepard Smith suggesting Detroit should burn down? Ann Coulter saying Rahm Emanuel's brother is on her "death list?" Or how about Fox News' "terrorism expert" Michael Scheuer who can't seem to get past a television camera without talking about killing?

You know what? Once again, I’m running some serious overkill here- so I better just cut off. Shame, too because for both racist and violent rhetoric, I could have done afewdooziesfromFoxNation.

Perhaps I’m being unfair to Megyn Kelly and her colleagues - perhaps when they said they’ve never seen it, they meant “never” as in they just happened to be away from the Tee-Vee every time it happened. Fortunately, lots of others have catalogued examples. So now, all anyone at Fox has to do is, you know… look. Which once again raises the question: Is the network incapable of owning up to what goes n there, or just unwilling?